


Names

by Drake



Category: Deus Ex (Video Games), Deus Ex: Mankind Divided
Genre: M/M, i mean what, it's not canon denial, pre-universe alteration
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-31
Updated: 2019-10-31
Packaged: 2021-01-15 05:23:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,964
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21248150
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drake/pseuds/Drake
Summary: Vaclav Koller navigates survival in a post-Incident Prague, along with a few surprises.





	Names

**Author's Note:**

> throw me on a hell flight, see me write a bit I guess, LOL. Also...desu sent me somethin and I couldn't help myself

Vaclav Koller has many clients, who come from all over Prague. Sometimes farther, if they cannot find a mechanic in their town. It is not unusual, these days. Not with Golem, with how often truckloads of people, of _augs_ get shipped there.  
  
Vaclav would be, too. Should be. Fuck knows the police love to shake him down whenever they get a chance. Except even the police fear the Dvali, and Vaclav belongs to them. Not that anyone is allowed to know just how far that goes. Even Otar thinks he’s the one who controls Vaclav.  
  
Whatever it takes for him to keep working, to keep his bookshop, Vaclav will do it. Even if it means sneaking through the city after lockdown to pay Radich a visit, when Radich’s own guards will shoot him if they so much as see him. It’s fine.  
  
Of course, it gets a lot _less_ fine when his favorite customer gets dragged off. Or at least that’s what he hopes happened to him. Because it’s better than the other option. That he’s dead somewhere in a gutter, alone, that he didn’t know what was coming, or worse, that he _did_. So Vaclav tells himself he’s in Golem, and maybe he’ll see him again when eventually all his favors run out and he gets taken too.  
  
Except it keeps getting worse, especially now that there isn’t someone often hanging around on his couch to at least try to keep him safe. The sprinter blades he’d been working on sit dusty, under a pile of other parts. Hidden, but not discarded. Not scrapped for their precious metal. Holding out hope in a world that’s getting bleaker and bleaker.  
  
And what’s fucking Rucker doing about it? Nothing but bleating and baa’ing, hoping the naturals will just _leave augs alone_. And why would they do that, when they make such good punching bags? Such a good scapegoat for humanity’s aching pain, haunting them all. Right. Some utopia city just for augs.  
  
As if that’s even possible. As if Tai Yong will let anyone else produce neuropozyne. And without nupoz, they’re just as choked anywhere as they are in Golem.  
  
Vaclav starts to see ARC’s golden wings more and more often, and he’s tempted to go out and spraypaint over the one in his courtyard. But that would draw attention, and he’s already doing enough of that. So he walks past it with just a casual flip of his middle-torch, and keeps going to pick up his to-go order of chicken feet.  
  
It’s only when he’s walking back home, steaming container held in hand, happily munching, that someone slams into him, sending his precious food flying - his tiny treat, the first time he’s had something that wasn’t instant noodles in week - and drags him into the dark alley. Around the corner, out of sight of the police checkpoint. Shit.  
  
“Koller,” the man snarls, fist curled in his flannel, walking him back into the darknes.  
  
“H-hey, man, hey,” Vaclav protests, hands up placatingly. “I’m sure this is a misunderstanding, we can work this out.”  
  
“work what out, that you’re hiding something from Otar, and that you keep ordering shit we didn’t ask for?” he growls, his rakia-soaked breath blowing in Vaclav’s face.  
  
He’s good, good at not reacting and recoiling from the smell. “I don’t know what you’re talking about man, I gotta stock my shop, you understand.”  
  
“Then why the hell you keep comin’ through the Dvali place at night, huh?” he asks, fist curling threateningly, pulling his shirt up, almost enough to lift him.  
  
Definitely untucking it from his pants.  
  
“Well- that’s above your pay grade, isn’t it, my guy?” Vaclav asks, his heart pounding beneath the friendly smile he wears.  
  
“Like fuck it is!” he shouts, shoving the mechanic into a wall, his alloy fist pressing against all-too-natural ribs.  
  
“Listen-“ Vaclav wheezes, “you’re making a mistake. For your sake, man, let me go.”  
  
“I don’t like punks who think they’re hot shit,” the man snarls.  
  
“Neither do I,” says someone else, someone cast in silhouette from the lamps on the street. And then there’s a shower of gold sparks, crackling, falling from his legs, and Vaclav can’t help the aching sound at the back of his throat, though it maybe sounds like fear.  
  
And then the shape is gone, rocketing forward, and Vaclav sees, two inches from his face, the way a metal blade snaps the man’s jaw to the side and sends him tumbling to the ground, groaning.  
  
And then it’s just the two of them, the attacker rising slowly to his full height, and Vaclav gasps softly.  
  
“It- they- they dragged you off,” he breathes, because he can’t comprehend what he’s seeing. _Who._  
  
“Yeah. They did,” he says, stepping close, looking over him, his aug eyes shining with worry.  
  
_“Ivan!”_ Vaclav shouts, flinging himself at him, sending Ivan stumbling back a two-step, clack _clack_ on his blades, as he hugs him tight. “I thought- I thought I’d never see you again, or _worse_.”  
  
“Yeah. Me too,” Ivan answers, his own arms wrapping around Vaclav just as tightly.  
  
Ivan Berk had many names. Runner. Messenger. Thief. He was known for getting in and out of somewhere, task accomplished, before anyone knew it happened. Sometimes leaving a mess. It was bound to catch up to him sometime. Which is why Vaclav can’t believe he’s here, breathing, in his arms.  
  
“Hey- let’s get you out of here.” Ivan reluctantly sets Vaclav back onto his feet, but he keeps his hands on him. On his arms, still checking him for injury. Or maybe just drinking in the sight of him.  
  
“What are- how did you get out?” Vaclav asks as Ivan tugs him from the alley, squeezing his hand and letting himself be pulled. Not even noticing the spilled food, already cold on the asphalt.  
  
Ivan’s expression twists, at that. “Got a job. Few days from now. I...” he looks around. “We’ll talk.”  
  
It’s not far to his bookshop, and Vaclav understands just how many prying ears abounded on these streets. Especially these days. Especially about a pair of augs walking hand in hand. So he shuts up, taking his turn to scrutinize Ivan. To see how he’s been in the last few weeks.  
  
They go straight to the dungeon, and then Vaclav turns to face him, hands on his arms, looking up at him like he can’t quite believe he’s actually awake. Though the shakedown felt quite real, he supposes.  
  
“I’m here,” Ivan says, reaching a hand up to cup his cheek, expression softening. “I really am.”  
  
Vaclav makes some wordless sound of aching relief, and then he steps into him and kisses him, hard and sloppy, a little desperate. Ivan groans into his lips, walks him back to the wall, pressing him to it, his touch so different, so much _softer_ than the last time his back met a wall.

  
  
Vaclav doesn’t notice the way his back twinges, doesn’t care. Because Ivan’s lips are on his, and he couldn’t ask for anything more, hands sliding up under his hoodie, seeking out the warmth of his skin.  
  
“Missed me that much?” Ivan asks into his lips, a sly grin.  
  
“Course. You didn’t?” Vaclav asks, and he’d pout if he wasn’t so close, couldn’t just lean in and kiss him again. Which he does. that’s the far better plan.  
  
Ivan’s rumbled laugh, low in his throat, is a sound Vaclav has sorely missed. Has thought he’d have to dig up old info link recordings to hear again. He hadn’t quite mustered up the will to do it yet. Convinced that if he did, he’d be accepting that Ivan wasn’t ever coming back.  
  
There are no more words, not for a long while. Ivan finishes the process of untucking Vaclav’s shirt, his alloy hands roaming the mechanic’s chest, remapping it. Checking for any new damage, anything he missed, that he couldn’t protect him from.  
  
Vaclav’s breathless, lips kiss-swollen, by the time he pulls back a bit. “You- you said...a job?” He asks, looking up at him, concerned.  
  
Ivan sighs softly, a small exhale of breath against Vaclav’s cheek. “Yeah. ‘S the only way I could get out. Marchenko, big fuck of a guy, he’s been building me up to this for months. ‘Bout how I’m gonna go out in a blaze of glory for ARC.”  
  
Vaclav’s eyes widen, afraid now. Because that sounds a hell of a lot like dying. “Wh-“  
  
“Hang on,” Ivan says, soft and reassuring, cupping Vaclav’s cheek. Thumb stroking under his eye. “He wants- he wants me to blow up the station. I- I have to. If I don’t, he’s gonna do something worse. He wants me to make sure it goes off. By staying next to it.”  
  
Vaclav is about to interrupt again, but there’s something in Ivan’s eyes. Something that isn’t resignation. Acceptance. It’s the fire of survival. The fighter that Ivan is.  
  
“He’s going to think I did. I’ll let them all think I died in the blast. And then- then I’ll be free. To be here with you,” Ivan breathes, and the fire’s dimmed now. It’s- worry, in his eyes. Watching Vaclav’s reaction.  
  
“What- what station? The power grid?” Vaclav asks, swallowing as he processes the information. Infrastructure damage sounds like something ARC might do, with all of their peace-keeping talk.  
  
Ivan looks away. “Ruzicka.”  
  
Vaclav’s hand slips from Ivan’s hoodie. “ARC. You- _ARC_ wants you to bomb a train station full of naturals _and_ augs?” That doesn’t make any sense. Vaclav wouldn’t have been hating Rucker for so long if he had any bite to his bark.  
  
“No,” Ivan says softly. “Marchenko. He’s Rucker’s second. And...plotting something. I- I know if I stayed any longer, he’d find a way to dispose of me. I know too much.”  
  
Vaclav knows this is big, for Ivan. To tell him this. A sign of just how desperate he is to escape. “So...you bomb the train station. Make it look as if you died in there. and- and that’s it?” He asks, making sure he understands.  
  
Ivan winces. “At...the morning rush hour.”  
  
“Shit.” How many lives- how many need to be traded? How many for Vaclav to just be_ happy_ again? And is he...willing to do that.  
  
No. No, he’s not.  
  
“I know. I- I didn’t see any other way.”  
  
Vaclav pauses. But he doesn’t pull away from Ivan. Doesn’t want him to think he’s reacting badly to him. To him being willing to do this much.  
  
how many people is he willing to kill to get back to Vaclav? He’s not sure he wants to know that answer.  
  
“And he gave you the bomb, or you- you have to make it?” Vaclav asks, mind racing. His skull plate whirrs softly, warming.  
  
“He told me where to get it. Already put the order in.”  
  
“He did?” Vaclav asks, to be sure.  
  
Ivan nods.  
  
“Okay- okay. You have to take out the whole station...” which is- too much. “What if we take out less?”  
  
“How?” Ivan asks, gaze snapping to his. Catching the thread of hope.  
  
“smaller charge. Put it somewhere more structurally sound. Maybe in the tunnels. Does it matter if you get it right if they still think you’re dead?” He asks, reaching for Ivan’s yellow hoodie again, searching his face.  
  
“No...no, I suppose it does not.”  
  
“Right. So you pick up the bomb, and...I’ll make it smaller. If I can.” And get maps of the tunnels, see where the most infrastructure is built around. It would still destroy the tracks, maybe some more structural damage, but at least it won’t kill hundreds of people.  
  
“Fuck, I missed you,” Ivan breathes, and kisses him again.  
  
Ivan Berk has many names.  
  
Vaclav’s prefers ‘love’.

**Author's Note:**

> hehehe as always, thanks to the lovely desuex for indulging me in this commission <3 
> 
> am i slowly turning some of you to join me in this ship pls tell me if so


End file.
